


Telling Love Stories

by lionessvalenti



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Alternate Universe - The Old Guard (Movie 2020) Fusion, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-18
Updated: 2020-10-18
Packaged: 2021-03-08 19:53:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 715
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27072292
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lionessvalenti/pseuds/lionessvalenti
Summary: Bucky comes back to Wakanda and tells the princess of his past. So long ago.
Relationships: James "Bucky" Barnes/Original Male Character(s)
Comments: 4
Kudos: 13
Collections: Little Black Dress Flash 2020





	Telling Love Stories

**Author's Note:**

  * For [GlassesOfJustice](https://archiveofourown.org/users/GlassesOfJustice/gifts).



"You're the White Wolf."

Bucky sat back in the comfortable chair with the cup of tea the princess had given him. She'd made it herself, unpretentious and easy. "I suppose I am. That's what they called me."

She sat down across from him, pulling her legs up into her chair, and she smiled. "I thought you would be older."

"I'm older than I look." Bucky looked down into his cup. It was breaking all the rules to admit to this. They never made connections like this. No one was to know their secret. Much less a precocious teenager in a fancy lab.

She leaned forward, her own tea nearly pouring right out of the mug she held between both hands. "How old, exactly? My Baba told me stories that his Baba had told him, that he had been told from his great-uncle. After that the trail of the story gets muddied. But a few of them had tales of your aid."

Bucky took a sip of tea. It was spicy. It tasted good. "What have you heard?"

"That the White Wolf comes when Wakanda is in need."

"Wakanda isn't often in need."

"No," Princess Shuri said it proudly. "So is it a title or... are you really over three hundred years old?"

Bucky was closer to eight hundred years old this day, only a mere five hundred (give or take) when he had met the Wakandan war dog, T'Kelo. 

"This is not your fight, white man," had been the first words T'Kelo had said to him.

"Doing the right thing is everyone's fight," Bucky had replied, though he still went by James at that time. The name Bucky wouldn't come to him until the Great War. "And I'm going to stop these men."

"You see," Bucky said to Shuri, who was already riveted by the story, "we had both been tracking the same slave traders for days. There was a mountain pass where I could trap them. T'Kelo knew that too."

"You were to ambush them," Shuri said.

"Yes. Before they got to the village. It took some convincing, but T'Kelo allowed me to travel with the group. An extra pair of hands didn't hurt."

Bucky got his throat slit in the fray. T'Kelo saw him come back to life.

When they were washing the blood from their hands in a river afterwards, T'Kelo asked, "Who are you? A white man who kills slave traders and doesn't die?"

Bucky had studied him as he spoke. He had been watching T'Kelo since the moment he had first been threatened by him.

"None of those things are the most interesting thing about me."

T'Kelo sat back on his heels. "Then tell me what is."

Bucky didn't tell Shuri about how T'Kelo had kissed him. The nights spent camped away from the other war dogs until they made it to Wakanda. Even now, he could still feel T'Kelo's hands on him.

"I've never met a white man who wasn't a slave trader," T'Kelo said in the dark of night. He rested his hand on Bucky's stomach. "Why do you do it?"

"The right thing isn't negotiable," Bucky replied. He kissed T'Kelo softly. "You saw what I could do. You keep going that long, you have to find a purpose."

T'Kelo smiled. It was too dark to see, but Bucky could hear it in his voice as he said, "I'm glad your purpose ran into mine."

"You fell in love with him," Shuri said. He didn't need to say much for her to read between the lines.

"Yes." Bucky smiled. "It's hard to fall in love when you're... like me. But I keep doing it. Over and over again."

Shuri's tea had been forgotten, but she still held the mug. "I still don't know that I believe you. The science part of me tells me it's impossible. But I do love a good romance. Is that why you came back? To fall in love? Wakanda is not in need, not right now."

Bucky shook his head. "It's my refuge, too. I don't ask for it often, but I appreciate that even after all these years, Wakanda welcomes me."

She smiled, but she didn't ask what needed refuge from. He appreciated that. "Well, maybe you'll find love again, nonetheless."

"Maybe."


End file.
